Fusion Productions - Integrating Meetings, Learning & Technology

Scripts

MPI's 2003-2004 Chairwoman Terri Breining, CMP, CMM delivered a motivational address around the importance of MPI's new strategic initiatives. The entire text of that speech appears below.

Welcome! Coming to San Francisco for this conference is like coming home for me — this is where I was born and spent part of my childhood — and that opening performance certainly brought back some memories.

Sometimes we idealize the past — but that time in the sixties really was, like the song says, the dawn of a "new age." And in many ways, this Congress represents a new age for MPI.

The planets have aligned, thanks to the vision and hard work of our MPI members, and it's time to "let the sun shine in."

Now I want to tell you a little bit about what you can look forward to over the next few days, and I will update you on what's happening for MPI over the next few weeks and months, but first, I'd like to acknowledge our Northern California chapter, the host committee and our host sponsors for their efforts on putting this conference together.

I'd also like to let you know that this general session will close with the first-ever performance of the MPI Congress Chorale — comprised entirely of MPI members — under the direction of Rick Weaver of the Greater New York Chapter. So make sure you stick around for that!

The strategic plan that George referred to is about the evolution of our industry. This plan, entitled "pathways to excellence" contains three major strategies. They are:

• Create professional development pathways and resources that enable members to evolve their careers toward positions of strategic understanding and influence.
• Increase our influence with senior decision-making executives, so that they understand the value of meetings in their own organizations.
• Make sure our supplier members continue to find MPI a rich environment for doing business.

The meetings industry is really a very young one. Tourism has been around for a long time, as has hospitality, but the profession of meeting planning has only existed as a profession for a few decades. And, it's taken us that time to figure out the necessary skills, training and experience we need in order to deliver a well-executed meeting or event. It's now time for us to go to the next level as an industry. It's time for us to serve our organizations, our attendees, the business community and our peers in a more relevant way.

Just as all of us individually are in the business of service, MPI exists to serve its members, and the focus of that service is embodied in the strategic plan. This is a dynamic plan that we will be continually evaluating against the changing business environment. As it changes we need to ensure that MPI is in the forefront of that change. When this plan is executed, it holds the promise of transforming the relationship of meetings — and those who produce them — in the world of business.

It's about meeting planners having broader business skills that enable us to communicate more effectively in the language of business.

It's about the executive leadership within an organization having an understanding and appreciation of the value of meetings, rather than viewing them solely as an expense.

It's about understanding that those who hold positions as meeting planners are true professionals who are committed to the highest degree of professionalism in our industry.

Can you imagine having a meeting professional included as a matter of course at the executive board table? Can you imagine participating at the early stages of a company's annual planning process to figure out together how meetings can be used more effectively to support those plans? Can you imagine not being the first on the cutting block when the next tough economic time hits us?

It's happening in some corners of our membership, but not nearly enough. Those things are possible with this new plan. However, this is not just the work of the international board or committees. It's not just up to our paid staff in Dallas, Ottawa and Luxembourg. It's not just up to chapter leaders. It's going to take all of us together to get there. It's going to take every one of us focusing on what contributions we can make that help define the power of meetings to our chapters, our employers, our co-workers, our clients, our customers.

We're all in this together — planners, suppliers, men, women, every member of every ethnic group, and every member on every continent. If we sit back and continue to do what we've always done, we will get what we've always gotten; we will be put on the back burner and we will eventually become irrelevant. But, I promise you that if we all work on this together, we will succeed in redefining ourselves and we will see the dawning of a new age in the world of meeting and event management.

So don't just be spectators in this evolution... I invite you to participate in the creation of your own future.